2. God is All-powerful. “Behold I am the Lord, the God of all flesh; is there anything too hard for me?” Jer. xxxii, 27. “With God all things are possible.” Matt. xix, 26
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2. God is All-powerful. “Behold I am the Lord, the God of all flesh; is there anything too hard for me?” Jer. xxxii, 27. “With God all things are possible.” Matt. xix, 26
Infidel Objections to the Bible Answered. No. 2.
2. God is All-powerful. “Behold I am the Lord, the God of all flesh; is there anything too hard for me?” Jer. xxxii, 27. “With God all things are possible.” Matt. xix, 26.
God is Not All-powerful. “And the Lord was with Judah, and he drove out the inhabitants of the mountain; but could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron. Judges i, 19.” The omnipotence of God is plainly enough declared in the two passages first above quoted. It only remains to harmonize Judges i, 19, with them. This is easily done by a little attention to the grammatical construction. On this passage Horne remarks:— “This passage has been made the subject of the profane scoffs of Voltaire and his copyists, as though the Lord were unable to succeed against the inhabitants of the valley with their iron chariots; but it is wholly relieved by simply observing, that the he, when it is said, ‘he could not,’ does not refer to the Lord but Judah.” On the same verse Dr. Clarke remarks:— “Strange! were the iron chariots too strong for Omnipotence? The whole of this verse is improperly rendered. The first clause, The Lord was with Judah, should terminate the 18th verse, and this gives the reason for the success of this tribe: The Lord was with Judah, and therefore he slew the Canaanites that inhabited Zepath, &c., &c. Here, then, is a complete period: the remaining part of the verse either refers to a different time, or to the rebellion of Judah against the Lord, which caused him to withdraw his support. Therefore the Lord was with Judah, and these were the effects of his protection; but afterwards, when the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served Baalim, &c., God was no longer with them, and their enemies were left to be pricks in their eyes, and thorns in their side, as God himself had said.” “This is the turn given to the verse by Jonathan ben Uzziel, the Chaldee paraphrast: ‘And the WORD of Jehovah was in the support of the house of Judah, and they extirpated the inhabitants of the mountains: but afterwards, WHEN THEY SINNED, they were not able to extirpate the inhabitants of the plain country, because they had chariots of iron.’ They were now left to their own strength, and their adversaries prevailed against them.” The Douay Bible translates it much plainer than King James’ version. It reads as follows: “And the Lord was with Judah, and he (Judah) possessed the hill country, but was not able to destroy the inhabitants of the valley, because they had many chariots armed with scythes.” This makes it very plain that it was the same one who possessed the hill country who failed to obtain the valley; and this was Judah. So the skeptic finds a contradiction here, only by taking language written concerning Judah, and applying it to God, to whom it has no reference.